Listen back to features and interviews from 95bFM's daily news and current affairs show. Joel Armstrong, Castor Chacko, Oto Sequeira, and Caeden Tipler focus on the issues of Tāmaki Makaurau and elsewhere in independent-thinking bFM style. Monday-Thursday 12-1pm on 95bFM.
National party has proposed to send teen offenders to military-style boot camps. Ten to seventeen year olds are considered being put in a new “serious young offender” category. National's leader Christopher Luxon said the policy was about reforming young offenders and he was confident it would work. Amnesty International and others have said it’s a bad idea. Arno spoke to University of Auckland criminologist Dr Ronald Kramer to find out more.
Joe speaks to Greenpeace’s James Hita, who confronted a deep sea mining ship off a Mexican coast last week. He also speaks to Dr Nick Munn, a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy from the University of Waikato about justifying lowering the voting age.
95bFM’s News and Editorial Director Jess Hopkins speaks to White Ribbon Day Ambassador Floyd Ormsby about teaching and role modelling ‘healthy masculinity.’
Daniel looks at a project from Waka Kotahi which will look at lowering the speed limit. He talks to Professor of Human Geography Simon Kingham. He also speaks to Anita Azeem from the University of Otago about why gender stereotypes can be problematic in children's movies.
Finally, David speaks to Otago University’s Ben Wheeler about a lifesaving diabetes treatment.
Blood glucose levels are traditionally measured by the finger prick method.
A device will take a drop of blood from your finger between six to ten times a day and will measure the glucose level in the blood.
However, a new technology called a continuous glucose monitor will allow people with diabetes to go about their lives without having to stop multiple times a day to test their glucose levels.
David spoke to Otago University Professor Ben Wheeler about the technology.
'Power to the princess: This princess is brave, bold and needs no prince'
This is the title of a study showing that children movies often enforce gender stereotypes, but they also hold the power to quickly shift them.
Daniel spoke with Anita Azeem who explains how some disney movies carry strong messages about gender roles and how children are affected by these messages. She also talks about her research thats shows how gender stereotypes can be changed.
Daniel talks about this question with Simon Kingham. Across the country there are plans to lower the speed limits. These plans are part of the Road to Zero project which assigned local councils to envision a plan with zero deaths and serious injuries on New Zealand roads. According to Professor of Human Geography Simon Kingham this is the right thing to do.
Today is White Ribbon Day, an annual campaign aiming to prevent men’s violence by teaching and role modelling ‘healthy masculinity’.
This year the day is focused on tackling the causes of violence.
News and Editorial Director Jessica Hopkins spoke to White Ribbon Day ambassador Floyd Ormsby who is encouraging people to show kindness towards our young men, and to let them know that men can be caring, supportive, ethical, respectful, friendly, generous and awesome.”
They discuss White Ribbon Day and the message Ormsby wants people to take from his own experience.
Last week Greenpeace activists peacefully confronted a deep sea mining ship off the coast of Manzanillo, México as it returned to port from the Pacific.
Joe spoke to James Hita, Greenpeace Aotearoa campaigner on the matter, to get some insight into the impact of deep sea mining.
OraTai-ao, the NZ Climate and Health Council have joined the Free Fares Coalition – the Aotearoa Collective for Public Transport Equity.
News & Editorial Director Jessica Hopkins spoke to Dermot Coffey, a Co-Convenor of the Climate and Health Council, who represents health workers and students around the motu, about why they are joining the call to make public transport free and accessible for all.
This week the Supreme Court has made a judgement on lowering New Zealand’s legal voting age.
The court has accepted the claims made by members of the Make It 16 campaign that the current voting age limit of 18 is inconsistent with section 19 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. Essentially, preventing 16- and 17-year-olds from voting discriminates against them on the basis of their age.
The decision means parliament now has to defend the 18 age limit if it wants to keep it.
Joe spoke to Dr Nick Munn, a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy from the University of Waikato on the matter.
Since the 2019 Christchurch terrorist attack, the Labour Government has been looking to expand our hate speech laws.
Under the Human Rights Act, people in Aotearoa are protected from hate speech on the basis of colour, race, ethnic or national origins.
The Government initially proposed extending this to other groups who are vulnerable to harmful speech, including women, disabled people, and queer people.
But the government announced this week that they will only make one amendment to hate speech laws to include religious communities and are seeking broad support across parliament.
95bFM News & Editorial Director spoke to Activist Shaneel Lal about the changes.
Nicola Willis recently took over responsibility for grocery regulation after recently appointed consumer affairs minister Scott Simpson identified a conflict of interest. Willis says she is interested in introducing a competitor to the New Zealand supermarket duopoly, though whether this competitor will come from overseas or internally remains to be seen.
Also in politics this past week are US president Donald Trump’s tariffs, which have had massive economic impact in the US and internationally. While New Zealand is minimally affected by the tariffs, our economy only recently exited a recession, so we may be in a position of vulnerability to further economic instability.
In our weekly catchup with the National Party’s Tom Rutherford, Wire host Castor asked about each of these issues, beginning with plans to address the supermarket duopoly.
You can find the press conference referenced by Tom Rutherford here.
After months of hearings, submissions and debate, the Justice Select Committee has released its report into the Treaty Principles Bill, recommending that the bill not proceed.
The report found that of all submissions, nearly 90% were opposed, around 8% in support and just over 3% were unstated.
Despite this final damning backlash against the bill, David Seymour and the ACT party maintain that there is a place for the bill in Aotearoa, saying submissions often don’t reflect the majority view of the country.
For our weekly catch up, Producer Evie spoke to ACT’s Simon Court about the report, and what the ACT party intend to do next.
They also spoke about the tariffs imposed on trade by Donald Trump last week, and how the government expects them to impact New Zealand.
Finally, they spoke about an unfolding situation concerning ACT MP and Food Safety Minister Andrew Hoggard. An RNZ investigation late last week found a potential conflict of interest between the minister and his sister who is the executive director of a dairy company. The investigation found that her company had lobbied against the minister's office introducing tougher regulations on baby formula.
Three Te Pāti Māori MPs, Hana Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, and Rawiri Waititi, did not attend the Privileges Committee over their contempt of the House, following their haka in Parliament protesting the Treaty Principles Bill.
The party instead are planning on holding their own hearing regarding the matter.
Privileges Committee chairwoman Judith Collins, called the no-show “unprecedented” and has given the MPs “one final chance” to attend the hearing.
For our weekly catch up, News and Editorial Director and Monday Wire Host, Joel, spoke to Te Pāti Māori’s Takutai Kemp about the party’s action, and why they are going about the hearing in their own manner.
We also spoke about the repeal of Section 7AA of the Oranga Tamariki Act passing its final reading.
But first, we discussed the party not attending the Privileges Committee.
Last week, Green Party MP Tamatha Paul made comments about the police and the expansion of beat patrols in Wellington, saying they make a lot of people feel “less safe.”
The comments have been criticised by MPs across National, Act, New Zealand First, as well as Labour.
And Finance Minister Nicola Willis is seeking specialist external advice on what ways the supermarket duopoly could be restructured.
For our weekly catch-up with the Labour Party, Wire Host Caeden spoke to Deputy Leader Carmel Sepuloni about these issues.
Auckland Transport has announced another parking fare increase, pushing up parking across AT-managed lots 50 cents per hour.
They justified the increase as necessary to cover ‘rising operational costs’ and to cover the Auckland Council’s increased resource commitment to supporting Aucklanders with “issues like blocked driveways, footpaths, and clearways”.
As well, Auckland Council have voted to endorse the redevelopment of Eden Park, in favour of a new waterfront stadium — bringing the latest development in a long-standing discussion about the best approach to attract tourism and financial productivity to Auckland.
All they need now is the government to pitch in $100 million dollars to fund the project.
Producer Sara started her interview with Shane Henderson by asking why raising parking prices was the preferred option for covering council operational costs
Former Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte has been arrested by the International Criminal Court and will be tried in the Hague for crimes against humanity.
This comes as the ICC faces criticism for other, more controversial current arrest warrants, including those against Russian President Vladimir Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Wire Host Caeden spoke to Dr Yvonne Breitwieser-Faria from Curtin University in Perth about Duterte’s arrest and broader issues facing the ICC.
BirdCare Aotearoa is a wild, native bird hospital that works to rehabilitate sick and injured birds back into the wild.
For their upcoming event: ‘Bird Heros,’ a part of EcoFest 2025 on the 6th of April, the workshop will look at the best practices on rescuing wild native birds, and will include a tour of their bird hospital, which is not usually open to the public.
For this week's Green Desk, Producer Leilani spoke to the Hospital Manager at BirdCare Aotearoa, Pooja Dorle, about the rehabilitation processes of birds within their hospital ahead of their next workshop.
Fellow Green Desk Producer Liam, and News and Editorial Director Joel, went to the previous workshop over the weekend, and spoke to the Chair of the organisation, Kevin Furgeson, and volunteer Marina, and had a tour of their facilities. Thanks EcoFest!
BirdCare Aotearoa also has a fundraiser running to shed light on seabirds affected by street lights and brightly lit buildings across the city, affecting their migration patterns and causing birds, such as the protected Petrels, Shearwaters, and Prions, to fall and injure themselves. To support their clinical rehabilitation practices, you can support their campaign on givealittle.
For a number of years, Aotearoa has been dealing with a shortage of psychologists and similar professionals to deal with the growing mental health needs of the wider population, with estimates suggesting that an additional 1,000 more psychologists are needed to fill gaps in the profession.
In response to the country’s growing mental health needs, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey announced a new Associate Psychologist role, consisting of recent post-graduates, to work alongside fully trained Psychologists.
However, a number of Psychologists and experts have criticised the introduction of this new role, saying that these associate Psychologists may be expected to take on the responsibilities of clinical Psychologists despite being underqualified.
For this week’s Get Action! Oto spoke to Dr Kumari Valentine, a clinical psychologist based in Dunedin, who’s launched a petition calling on the government to roll back the introduction of the new Associate psychology role and look to other methods of filling gaps in the Psychology profession.
If you're interested in signing this petition, you can find it here:
Just recently, Workplace Relations and Safety Minister, Brooke Van Velden, announced sweeping changes to health and safety regulations for businesses that she described as “low-risk”.
Some of the changes involved: narrowing the focus of the Health and Safety at Work Act to risks only causing death, serious injury or illness, creating a hotline for the public to report “overzealous” road cone placement and reducing "tick-box and safety activities" such as psychosocial harm policies for small businesses.
Around this same period of time, Greens MPs Tamatha Paul and Benjamin Doyle received intense media and political scrutiny for comments they made at a university panel and on social media respectively, with the backlash towards Doyle forcing them to abstain from parliament this week.
The Greens recently issued a call to the government to scrap their proposed changes to Early Childhood Care, which involve recognising qualifications other than early childhood teaching qualifications, removing up to 74% of ECE licensing criteria and removing requirements for regular updates and family.
In their weekly catchup with the Green Party’s Ricardo Menendez-March, Oto spoke to him about the party’s take on all of these issues.
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